'''Constance Paulina Hoster''' (8 July 1864 – 1 June 1939) was a British writer and pioneer in training women for employment.
Born in St Pancras, London, the only daughter of Marcus Kalisch, an Old Testament scholar and migrant from Prussian Pomerania, Hoster had a brother, Alfred Kalisch, who later became a barrister, journalist, and musical historian.<ref name=TimesObit>"Mrs. Constance Hoster – Employment of Educated Women" (obituary), ''The Times'', 3 June 1939</ref><ref>"Constance Hoster, of 29 Grosvenor-place, S.W.1. and St. Stephen’s Chambers, Telegraph-street, E.C.2" ''Marylebone Mercury'', Saturday 10 June 1939, p. 3</ref>
On 9 October 1889, at Dieppe, she married Albert Bertram Mathew Hoster, of Saint-Nicolas-d'Aliermont, Normandy, and Grove House, Sydenham.<ref>"MARRIAGES: HOSTER—KALISCH – On the 9th inst., at the British Consulate, Dieppe, by H. M. Consul, H. W. Lee-Jortin, Albert Bertram Mathew Hoster, of St. Nicholas d'Aliermont, Seine Inférieure, and Grove House, Sydenham, to Constance Paulina Kalisch", ''Epsom Journal'', Tuesday 22 October 1889, p. 2</ref>
In 1895, she petitioned for divorce and in 1896 obtained a final decree in the High Court of Justice.<ref>"Albert Bertram Matthew Hoster" in ''England & Wales, Civil Divorce Records, 1858-1918'', accessed 13 July 2025 {{subscription}}</ref>
In 1893, faced with the need to support herself, Hoster launched her business career, encouraged by Gertrude King, Secretary of the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women. She soon began to train other women in typing and shorthand writing, to work as secretaries, launched an employment agency for women, and founded the Educated Women Workers' Loan Training Fund.<ref name=Bridger>"In Memoriam: we have to record with very great regret the death of Mrs Hoster", Appendix 23 in Anne Bridger, [https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/3098/1/DX235954_Redacted.pdf "A Century of Women's Employment in Clerical Occupations 1850–1950"], University of Gloucester thesis, accessed 15 July 2025</ref><ref name=Pioneer/>
By January 1909, Hoster was occupying St Stephen's Chambers, Telegraph Street, London E.C., running a business called Queen Anne's Typewriting Shorthand & Translating Offices.<ref>[https://digital.library.lse.ac.uk/Documents/Detail/mrs-hoster-to-miss-p-strachey-c.-jan-1909/135742?item=135743 Letter from Constance Hoster to Miss Strachey], digital.library.lse.ac.uk, accessed 13 July 2025</ref> In 1920, she founded the Gertrude King scholarship.<ref name=Bridger/> By the time of her death in 1939, she owned Mrs Hoster's Secretarial College in the Cromwell Road, Kensington, and another in the City of London at St Stephen's Chambers.<ref name=Pioneer>"PIONEER AMONG WOMEN" (obituary) in ''Birmingham Mail'', Saturday 3 June 1939, p. 9</ref>
An obituary noted that Hoster trained "well-educated women" for positions in the secretarial, commercial, and political worlds: in short, applicants needed to have a good education before coming to her.<ref name=Pioneer/>
Hoster was one of the first women to be elected to the London Chamber of Commerce.<ref>"CITY WOMAN PIONEER Mrs. Constance Hoster Dead" (obituary), ''Evening News'' (London), Saturday 3 June 1939, p. 5</ref> She also became President of the City of London Society for Equal Citizenship and vice-president of the Union of Jewish Women, the Society of Women Journalists, and the City of London branch of the League of Nations Union. She was a governor of the Royal Free Hospital and the London Jewish Hospital.<ref name=TimesObit/>
A Conservative, Hoster was on the Committee of the women's branch of the City of London Conservative and Unionist Association.<ref name=TimesObit/>
She belonged to the Ladies' Carlton Club, the Cowdray Club, the Langham Place Group, and the Overseas, Pioneer, and Forum Clubs.<ref name=Pioneer/>
Hoster died on 1 June 1939, at 7 Sheffield Terrace, Kensington, leaving an estate valued for probate at £20,565;<ref>"HOSTER Constance Pauline" in ''Wills and Administrations (England and Wales) 1939'' (London: High Court of Justice, 1940), p. 373</ref> but Mrs Hoster's Secretarial College in Kensington continued to flourish. During the Second World War, it was evacuated to a large house near Stamford, Lincolnshire, but returned to London when the bombing threat was over. The secretarial course typically lasted six months and was funded by charging fees. In the 1940s, the Union of Jewish Women provided a scholarship at Mrs Hoster's to be held by a Jewish girl recommended personally by the Union.<ref name=Soton>[https://specialcollectionsuniversityofsouthampton.wordpress.com/2020/03/20/we-seek-to-promote-wherever-possible-the-social-moral-and-spiritual-welfare-of-the-jewish-woman-the-union-of-jewish-women-collection/ "We seek to promote, wherever possible, the social, moral, and spiritual welfare of the Jewish woman: the Union of Jewish Women collection"], University of Southampton Special Collections, accessed 14 July 2025</ref>
By the 1950s, the College was known for turning out "gels for the establishment".<ref name=Times>[https://www.thetimes.com/culture/books/article/jane-cornwell-obituary-2x9bfqjtb "Jane Cornwell obituary: Editor and wife of John le Carré"], ''The Times'', 9 March 2021, accessed 12 July 2025 {{subscription required}}; [https://archive.today/20240625141004/https://www.thetimes.com/culture/books/article/jane-cornwell-obituary-2x9bfqjtb archived] at archive.ph</ref> It continued in business until 1969, with Mrs P. C. Bloncourt serving as Principal from 1956 to 1969. In its later years it was at 27, Brompton Road.<ref>[https://archives.soton.ac.uk/records/MS129/AJ161/v/28 "Mrs P.C.Bloncourt, Principal of Mrs Hoster's Secretarial Training College: correspondence, 1956-69"], University of Southampton archives, accessed 13 July 2025</ref>
==Selected publications== *Constance Hoster, "The training of educated women for secretarial and commercial work, and their permanent employment" in ''Journal of the Royal Society of Arts'' Vol. 65, No. 3353 (23 February 1917), 262–269 *Ellen, Countess of Desart, Constance Hoster, ''Style and Title: a Complete Guide to Social Forms of Address'' (London: Christopher's, 1925)
==Notable students of Mrs Hoster's Secretarial College== *Lady Cynthia Postan<ref>[https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/cynthia-postan-obituary-drbhgcml8 "Lady Cynthia Postan"] ''The Times'', 6 December 2017 {{subscription}}</ref> *Monica Maurice<ref>[https://www2.theiet.org/resources/library/archives/research/wes/WES_Vol_4a.html "Monica Maurice: Mine Lighting Engineer"], ''The Woman Engineer'' volume IV (December 1935), pages 66–67</ref> *Stevie Smith<ref>[https://rpo.library.utoronto.ca/taxonomy/term/1246 "Smith, Stevie (1902–1971)"] ''Representative Poetry Online'', accessed 13 July 2025</ref> *Doreen Pugh, secretary to Winston Churchill<ref>[https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/doreen-pugh-obituary-nrptjx2qv "Doreen Pugh obituary: Devoted secretary to Winston Churchill who spent ten years working for the former prime minister and guarded his legacy"], ''The Times'', 26 July 2021 {{subscription}}</ref> *Joan Bright Astley<ref>[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/4077305/Joan-Bright-Astley.html "Joan Bright Astley"] (obituary) ''The Daily Telegraph'', 2 January 2009 {{subscription}}</ref> *Jane Cornwell<ref name=Times/> *Anne Griffiths<ref>"Obituary: Dame Anne Griffiths", ''The Times'', 26 May 2017</ref>
==Notes== {{reflist}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Hoster, Constance Pauline}} Category:1876 births Category:1939 deaths Category:Founders of English schools and colleges Category:English people of German-Jewish descent Category:People from St Pancras, London Category:Writers from the London Borough of Camden